Before proceeding it is helpful to define the following terms:
Content: any material that is possible to distribute electronically to consumers, such as, for example, advertisements, movies, recorded music, world wide web pages, or the like. Electronic content refers to material that may be distributed digitally, such as, for example, sampled music, digital video, or the like.
Producers: makers of content, such as, for example, an advertiser, an actor, a movie production company, a music production company, or the like.
Distributors: owners of communication channels, such as, satellite companies, cable-TV companies, telephone companies, Internet access providers, or the like.
Subscribers: members of the general public that are consumers of content, such as, individuals receiving cable-TV, individuals with access to the Internet, or the like.
Viewer: a device, such as, for example, a personal computer and/or work station, used to view content, visually as well as audibly.
Many producers of electronic content provide electronic content to various content distributors. The content distributors, in turn, select and route electronic content to subscribers. For example, a producer of electronic content may be an advertiser providing national advertisements to local cable-TV distributors. The local cable-TV heads, in turn, select national advertisements provided by the advertiser, insert these national advertisements into the local cable-TV programming, and provide the programming with the inserted advertisements to cable subscribers. FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating the distribution of advertisements from several advertisers 102, 104, and 106, through a content distributor 110, to subscribers 120, 122, 124, 126, and 128.
Payment agreements between a producer of content and a distributor of content depend on the content that is received by subscribers. The content received by subscribers may be classified as either "art" or "advertising". When the content received by subscribers is deemed "art" the content distributor pays the content producer per distribution of content to subscribers. When the content received by subscribers is deemed "advertising" the content producer pays the content distributor per distribution of content to subscribers.
For example, suppose video is the medium by which content is distributed. Pay-per-view movies in hotel rooms received via cable and/or satellite links is content that is deemed "art". In this case, the cable and/or satellite company is the content producer, the hotel is the distributor of pay-per-view movies, and subscribers, receiving these movies, are the hotel occupants. An example of video received by subscribers that is deemed "advertising" is the example given above in which a distributor selects and inserts national advertisements in local cable-TV programming.
In the case where the medium by which content is distributed is the world wide web, an example of content that is deemed "art" is a retail site offering digitized music for sale. In this case, the owner of the rights to the digitized music is the content producer, the owner of the retail site is the content distributor, and anyone with access to the Internet is a potential subscriber. An example of content distributed over the world wide web that is deemed "advertising" is advertisements appearing in on-line newspapers and/or magazines. In this case, the content producer is the advertiser, the distributor is the owner of the on-line magazine and/or newspaper, and a subscriber is anyone with access to the on-line magazine and/or newspaper. FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating the distribution of content from producers 202, 204, 206, 208, and 210, through distributors 220, 222, and 224, to subscribers 230, 232, 234, 236, 238, 240, and 242.
The infrastructure conventionally used to distribute content from producers, through distributors, to subscribers is shown in FIG. 3. FIG. 3 shows: a producer's site 302, a distributors site 310, content distribution channels 320, and subscriber's sites 322, 324, and 326. The producer's site 302 includes a preparation engine 303 for packaging electronic data in preparation for distribution. The distributors site 310 includes: a content receiver 312, a device for receiving content provided by a producer; a content archive 314, a device for storing data (e.g. digital music, video, and/or advertisements); a distribution engine 316, a mechanism for determining when and what content to distribute to a subscriber 322, 324, and/or 326 via the content distribution channels 320; and a bypass 318, for bypassing the content archive 314, sending content directly from the content receiver 312 to the distribution engine 316. Both the content receiver 312 and the distribution engine 316 may communicate with the content archive 314. The subscriber's sites 322, 324, and 326, each include a viewer for viewing multimedia data.
A fundamental difficulty with the distribution of content as illustrated in FIG. 3 is that in order to comply with the payment agreements between a producer of content and a distributor of content, a trustworthy measurement of the content received by subscribers is required. It may be possible to alter the distribution infrastructure to accommodate measurements of content received by subscribers. A measurement of content received by a subscriber may be, for example, the number of pay-per-view movies watched, the number of musical pieces downloaded from the Internet, and/or the number of times a particular on-line magazine was accessed. The content distributor may measure the content received by subscribers. Alternatively, meters may be introduced at subscriber sites in order to allow a content producer to measure content received by subscribers. In either case, the content producer and content distributor need to trust one another. Either the content producer or the content distributor may, through malice and/or by bungling, skew the measurement results. For example, with content deemed "advertising" the distributor may increase his revenue by pretending to distribute content to a large number of subscribers. Another example of fraud by content distributors, such as a TV or radio broadcasting company, occurs when the distributor miscalculates the residual royalties due performers (content producers) appearing in, for example, advertisements.